Harry
Teasley is currently enjoying his stint at Valve Software, which has just
shipped their first title, Half-Life. The game has received rave
reviews and has been called the most involving and enthralling game since
Doom's release five years ago. However, Half-Life was not Harry's
first involvement with a first-person shooter. Anyone who has played
the Playstation or Nintendo 64 versions of Doom has seen Harry's handiwork
-- working with Midway Home Entertainment, he helped create the smash-hit
console versions of the game we all know and love.

Doomworld:
When was the first time you ever played Doom?

Harry: I
guess it was soon after the shareware was released. Sandy Petersen
gave me a call and told be to try it out, that it was quite fun.
I don't think he had any idea what sort of effect that call would have
on my life.

From his description,
it sounded like Wolfenstein3D with new textures. I was mildly interested,
but it didn't *sound* like a big deal. I installed it and was bowled
over. I became obsessed with Doom for a long time.

*cough* Sandy Petersen
called you to recommend it? How were you affiliated with the id boys
in the pre-Doom days?

ISandy and I worked
together at MicroProse, before he went to id. We were bridge partners,
and good friends (well, *were* bridge partners, *are* good friends.)

How did you get
your job at Midway?

I left MicroProse
in 1993 and decided to get a job in an area of the country that had year-round
motorcycle weather. I interviewed at Leland Interactive Media (they've
changed names twice now, changed ownership once), and got the job in San
Diego.

How did you become
involved in PSX Doom?

I happened to be
working at Williams Entertainment (now Midway Home Entertainment) as an
artist and designer, and our company made the deal to do some console ports
of Doom. I was playing and editing Doom very heavily, and so it was
natural that I get involved with these projects.

How long was the
development of PSX Doom?

Hmmm, just shy of
a year, I think.

Was an entirely
new engine coded, or was the Doom source code utilized?

Basically both,
I think. The renderer was completely redone, and a lot of optimizations
were made to get the game to run on the PSX console.

Who decided which
levels would be included in the PSX port?

Mostly I did, with
the help of the other designers. We went through all the published
versions of Doom, and weeded out those maps that would not work under the
constraints of the Playstation. Given the CD format, we really wanted
to include as much as we could, and ended up putting 59 maps into the final
game.

How much had to
be sacrificed in the PSX port in order to keep speed up?

Not much.
Things are done very differently on the Playstation as opposed to the PC,
so there was a lot of work in converting things, and manipulating things,
but not a lot of throwing away of things. Some areas in maps had
to simplified, and some monsters had to be removed from certain areas,
but on the whole, all "sacrifices" were made so as to minimize the impact
on gameplay. Few things ended up being removed completely.